Swimming has long been recognized as one of the most demanding and competitive sports in the world. Over the years, a variety of swimming aids have been developed and used by swimmers to train and improve swim performance. Such aids have been generally designed with the goal of increasing the swimmer's swim stroke efficiency and improving stroke technique and power. Basic to this is that a swimmer must train himself or herself to have proper swimming.
When a person is swimming, he or she need to be in perfect alignment in order to achieve a relaxed state when swimming. The swimmer's head needs to be down and his or her body should be in a level line as if a string was pulling them from the ends of the swimmer's extended finger tips, through the center of top of the swimmer's head, straight through the core, and down the swimmer's straight legs, through the end of the swimmer's pointed but relaxed toes.
In this position there is little or no drag, and, therefore, swimming is accomplished with relaxation (no struggle), and a beautiful stroke occurs with ease.
Proper alignment can be one of the most challenging things for a person to accomplish at any age (or swimming experience). The reason for this is because humans are not conditioned to be in prone positions, and the water is not human's natural environment.
Therefore, swimmers (especially persons learning to swim) typically possess a very mental block situation in their minds. Fear and panic often set in with this unknown situations (prone position), environment, being that the swimmer needs to hold his or her breath and learn to become relaxed. Although it is not a natural environment, a typical person can hold his or her breath comfortably for at least five second.
Beginning swimmers (children and adults) can be take lessons (such as Red Cross Levels 1 & 2) for years with little to no results. The longer the child/adult take lessons that are not successful, the more he or she will not like to put his or her face in a prone position (i.e., underwater while swimming), and the greater fear and anxiety he or she will have about doing so.
Many swimmers also struggle with a sinking problems or work really hard to swim even short distances because the swimmer's legs are bent (i.e., not properly positioned). The swimmer may position his or her legs by just bending at the knee or dropping his or her thighs below the buttocks and do a bicycle movement. Either of these two movements (or other improper movements) will cause the swimmer to struggle as if they are dragging a weight, thus making the swimmer's body come out of alignment, which makes the swimmer exert excessive energy. The swimmer's heart rate will go up, further causing the swimmer not to be relaxed.
Fixing the “bent legs syndrome” is thus important to a proper swimming technique. If a person is not relaxed while swimming, they are struggling, which can lead to exhaustion and panic. By reducing exhaustion and panic, this increases safety of the swimmer.
Accordingly, there is a need for swim training devices for beginning swimmers (and to refresh other swimmers) so that they will more readily learn proper swimming alignment.